Parents Upset After Photo Shows Students Sitting In School Bus Aisle

WAXAHACHIE (CBSDFW.COM) – A photo of kids sitting in the aisle of a moving school bus has many parents in Waxahachie concerned and upset.

A dad released the photo after his daughter told him kids were sitting in the aisle on Monday and Tuesday. The 11th grader says every seat on her bus was taken.

But Waxahachie Independent School District spokeswoman Jenny Bridges says the bus has enough seats for 77 kids and there were 73 kids on board.

“The driver… their responsibility is to make sure that all kids are safely in seats and that wasn’t noticed this time,” said Bridges. “That’s something that we have definitely counseled all of our bus drivers on, not just this particular bus driver.

The father of the student who took the photo maintains that there weren’t enough seats on the bus. He adds that even if the district’s version of events is true, the school bus should have never hit the road if kids were not safely in their seats.

“That bus driver should be suspended until they go through another evaluation to see how they’re driving,” said Jennifer McCulrey, a parent whose child was not on the bus.

The school district says the bus has a camera on board and the video confirms what they say. The video however, wasn’t released to CBS11 since children’s faces are visible.

“At no point should we ever go over that maximum capacity,” said Bridges. “We always stick to our safety standards and sorry that it didn’t happen in this case.”

There are now two buses handling that particular route. The district wouldn’t comment on whether the driver was disciplined.